The Divine Comedy — Dante Alighieri

Of courts the common ruin and the vice. Inflamed against me there the hearts of all, And they inflamed, Augustus so inspired, That my glad honours changed to strife's sad pall. My spirit, with disdainful passion fired, ^ Thinking with death alone to 'scape from scorn. Unjustly 'gainst myself, though just, conspired. By the new roots beneath this tree forlorn I swear to you my faith I never broke Against my lord, to honour duly bom. '* And should you either bear again eaxth's yoke justify my memory, which lies Still wounded by the force of Envy's stroked He paused awhile, and through the sUences The poet whispered, '' Lose not time in yain, ^ But speak to him should further question please." Whence I to him : '' Then question him again Of what you think will delight me best. 1 cannot speak myself for pity fain." Therefore he recommenced : " If your behest ^ This man should freely execute for you. Imprisoned spirit, please you for the rest To tell him how the spirit in the tree Is here allied, and if you can, explain If any from such frame can e'er be free." ^ Lme 68. '' I am the one who carried both the keys Of Frederic's heart.*' Fietro delle Vigne, a man who from a mean condition raised himself by his talents to the post of GhanceUor to the Emperor Frederic II., whom Dante has already placed amongst the condemned heretics. The dis^ced servant Bpeaks more honourably of his former master, " che fa d'onor si digno." £

60 HELL. Canto xm. Then yiolently sighed the trunk, and then Its wind in breathing to such speech converts. " To you my answer will be brief and plain. When from the body the fierce soul departs, From which itself by its own deed has torn, ** At Minos' doom to the seventh pit it starts. Within this forest is it straightway borne, No chosen spot, but there where Fortune shoots, There does it burgeon like a grain of com. The small branch sprouts and the tree strikes roots, ^^ Make torment and an opening for despair. The Harpies feeding on the leaves and fruits. Like others we our cast-off frames will bear. But not one limb will be again arrayed. What man's self spent he cannot justly wear. ^^^ Here we shall drag them, and in order laid Our forms will hang along this dreary wood, Each to the briar of its own hateful shade." Intently listening to the trunk we stood, Believing that it wished to tell us more, "" When we were startled by a clamour rude. And like to one who hears a wild boar Break towards him, with the pack in eager chase. Who hears the branches rend and the beasts roar. When, lo ! from the left comer of the place ^** Two torn and naked forms, rushing with speed. So that each branch was broken in their race. The one in front : " O Death, come now at need !" When he^ who somewhat lagged behind, appealed. Shouting out, '* Lano this way did not speed Those limbs of your at Toppo's battle-field." Then, when perchance his breath had failed him, he Fell in a bush and sought there for a shield. Behind them all the wood we swarming see With stark black bitches, hungering to tear, ^^ Eacing like greyhounds from the sHps let free. Line 101. " Make torment and an opening for despair, The Harpies." Through the wonnds inflicted by the Harpies these spirit trees have a vent for their angnish, the blood and wailing issuing together. Line 120. " Lano this way did not speed Those limbs of your at Toppo's battle-field." Lano was a Siennese, who having wasted all his fortune in riotous living, and finding life intolerable, threw himself into the thickest of the enemy when hiB countrymen were routed at Pieve del Toppo by the Aretines, and refusing to fly with the rest, found the death he sought for at their hands.

Caitto XIY. hell. 51 Their fangs they fixed on him who squatted there, And piece by piece, when he was wholly torn, On every side his quivering limbs they bear. My guide then took my hand, and onwards borne, ^^ He led me to that little bush that sighed. And through its bleeding fragments wailed forlorn. " Jacopo da Sant* Andrea !" it cried, " In seeking help from me to ttee what good ? What crime had I in your life's guilty pride ?*' ^" My master said, when opposite he stood, " Who, then, were you who through so many a wound Breathest such dolorous parley with your blood ?'* And he to us ; " O spirits who are bound Hither to witness this most shameful deed ^** That thus has stripped my foliage to the ground, Collect it at the foot of this sad weed. I was of Florence, which its early lord Changed for Baptista, whence has Mars decreed It should be wretched through his art abhorred ; ^** And were it not some remnant still remains Of the old sculpture upon Arno's ford, The men who, after Attila, were fain To raise up from the ruins the old walls Would but have lost their labour all in vain. ^^ I made a gibbet of my father's halls." Line 133. Jaoopo da Sant' Andrea 'was a Fadnon spendthrift who finished his career by snicide. Line 143. '* I was of Florence, which its early lord Changed for Baptista." Hare was the fiiit patron of the city, changed in GhristiaD times for the Saint Baptists.. At tfa^ date of this poem a portion of the old statue of Mars was still preserved on the bridge over the Amo, and was considered the Palladinm of the city. Itme 151. " I made a gibbet of my other's halls." This Florentine snicide is not named, though coi^jectares as to his personality have been made by tho early oommentaton. In the closing line he evidently compares his own usage of lus father's house with the conduct of the pious restoren of the city, who reconstructed the walla left in ruin by their forefathers after the destruction by Attila«